to feign any sense of objectivity.
We were born the same year. His first job out of college was as a poorly paid community organizer on Chicago's South Side-where I own a modest Hobbithole in the Hood. He is my neighbor. De facto. I drive by his home every day en route to my poorly paid-uh, er, actually, my entirely unpaid--job as a community educator in the very same neighborhood. His wife works for my alma mater. His granddaddy was a goat herder (I have a thing for dead goats, professional and personal). One time this summer, when I went to my "church" (a tree on the shore of Lake Michigan), I was surprised to see his wife and daughters sitting there discretely perched between the rocks, just a few yards from the place I go to put my tobacco down and pray. I said nothing, and tried my best not to stare. I cannot say that I refrained from "observing," though--and today I cannot help but call to mind Neil Young's call for a leader with "the Great Spirit on his side". So maybe it is Obama after all. Great. So put me in the same camp as the moronic female Bush voter from Wisconsin who, in the run up to the 2004 election said (I cite from memory): "Bush. Now there's a guy I could see goin' out to eat with, yaknow? But that other guy? Naw." And I thought to myself, "Yeah, honey, you just keep sittin' there waitin' for that invitation from George W. Bush to go have dinner at Old Country Buffet wit' you!" Voting on "charisma" and "commonality," not content. Hey, it beats voting on criminally negligent ignorance!
Yep. It's hit me. Obamania. But it's not just about the "rush." It's not just the fluff and eye candy. It's not. As I recently said to a friend-this country is not only brain dead: it's heart has stopped beating. There is no passion. No conviction. Not a shred of soul. Oh no. The corporate catapillagers have stripped that skeleton bare. Bare beyond the bone. What this country needs is not another "Terminator," a "De-cidicator", some half-baked Smart Bombshell who can't even keep her husband under control, much less some guy with his asscheeks stuck so tightly together he gets his undies in a twist over the vulgar idiom of the Blogosphere. In a world as saturated with obscenity, perversity, and over-the-top vulgarity as the world in which we currently write and live, how the fuck else are people expected to speak: shall we sanitize the insanity by speaking in terms of "foreign objects inserted into the rectal cavities of enemy combatants" or shall we call it what it is: "shoving dildos up Iraqi men's asses?" Let's get fucking real people: I'll take the Vice President's English over the President's unintelligible drivel any day. What this country needs is a defibrillator. And that is what Obamania is about: electroshock therapy for the heart
OK, so in my book, the cards have been stacked in favor of Obama from day one. Call it local patriotism. But don't assume that it's just about blind loyalty, because it's not.
Here's what triggered the "point of no return" for me.
As most of you know, I am a professor (an underpaid, overexploited "itinerant professor"-by choice, not by necessity-at a less-than-prestigious state university). And one reason I hate my job is that the students I generally see coming through my classes-not unlike the vast majority of the academic community, student body and faculty included-seem like the walking dead to me. Flatliners. Going along to get along. Their lives reduced to trudgery, drudgery, and the engagement in the basest forms of skullduggery. Apathy. Complacency. Paralyzed into a catatonic state of intellectual (and academic) dishonesty. Blech.
This is not the academic universe I was brought up in. It's not the environment that educated me. SDS. Student Feminist Alliance. Campaign to End Project ELF. Nuclear Free Zones. That's what we did for fun back in my day. Google didn't churn out our papers for us so we could waste our time voting for the next American Idol or sit around cruising for bruisings in fucking chatrooms. There was conviction in our lives. Passion. We were not zombified by the incendiary backdraft of two decades' Greed is God and I-for-Me-dotcomism.
We were academically, intellectually, spiritually and politically motivated-fueled by the winds of change most of our parents had at their backs. And those winds were no Idiot Winds. There was still a trace of blood on the tracks. We still had this sense of having skin in the game. All of that has been wiped clean by the past two decades of what I call the "calculus of the fiscal quarter."
But this semester, I've seen a change on campus. A big one. There's a buzz. Not unlike a stillness in the room heralding the heaves of storm. Something's happening. So the other day, this young undergrad walks into my class. She's on fire. Brunhilde's got nothin' on this modern-day Valkyrie! ;-)
Everyone in the residence halls is reading Dreams from My Father, yeah, and Obama's coming to campus to speak on Sunday. And she's on the organizing committee-the Obama campaign was looking for volunteers, and she signed up-along with about fifty others. Students. All of them. You can get VIP tickets if you go to the pavilion at such and such a time and agree to help make posters. Roll up your sleeves. Let's get to work.
There was a spark in that room that day. A spark that lit a fire. I watched it spread from one desk to the next. And the tears welling up in my soul at that moment-had I been wuss enough to unleash them-well, they'd have been enough to save Valhalla from doom. Because I have been waiting for a long damn time for this moment. And I've been working my sorry little academic-educator-artist ass off, sight unseen and in the most subversive of ways, hoping, praying, beseeching the powers that be: may the young become wise, may they rise up and lift this country up from this sleep of death. This sleep of dreams deferred, dismissed, gone down with the ship of fools.
That young woman told the class about the new T-shirts they'd had made in one of the many waves of Obama-mania sweeping the campus, "I'm wearing it," she said.
"Well," I replied, "can we see it? Come on, take off your sweater." And that's what she did. She got up and twirled around the classroom with a T-shirt that read "LIVE YOUR DREAMS."
Life has returned to campus. It's not just my classroom. And it's not just this school, it's not just this city. No it is not.
One group on Facebook, a social networking website especially popular with college students and recent graduates, called "One Million Strong for Barack" already had 100,000 members as of Thursday (it was started only a few weeks ago), and its creator expects to reach the million mark in April.
What was I saying a few weeks ago? When I see one million of my fellow Americans standing up for something they believe in, I will be number one-million-one. (Careful what you wish for, I guess-and what you promise! ;-)
OK, so maybe you're still thinking I've made this decision based on a bunch of hyper-emotive, wishy-washy, anecdotal, insubstantive--however "articulate" or inarticulate it may be--evidence.
Talk is cheap you say. Well, maybe it is: but if that's so-I'm sorry, I feel like I'm getting more for my money with Obama's "speechwriters" than I am from any of the rest of them.
Let's take a look at today's speech. What kind of "buzz words" are we getting for our money here. How about we take my "defibrillator" thesis to heart: how many times, and in what context does the word "heart" appear in this speech-I count six (but please, somebody, check my math-I'm not in the business of counting words, I just create them):
We all made this journey for a reason. It's humbling, but in my heart I know you didn't come here just for me, you came here because you believe in what this country can be.
My work took me to some of Chicago's poorest neighborhoods. I joined with pastors and lay-people to deal with communities that had been ravaged by plant closings. I saw that the problems people faced weren't simply local in nature - that the decision to close a steel mill was made by distant executives; that the lack of textbooks and computers in schools could be traced to the skewed priorities of politicians a thousand miles away; and that when a child turns to violence, there's a hole in his heart no government could ever fill.
The genius of our founders is that they designed a system of government that can be changed. And we should take heart, because we've changed this country before. In the face of tyranny, a band of patriots brought an Empire to its knees. In the face of secession, we unified a nation and set the captives free. In the face of Depression, we put people back to work and lifted millions out of poverty. We welcomed immigrants to our shores, we opened railroads to the west, we landed a man on the moon, and we heard a King's call to let justice roll down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.
Let us be the generation that reshapes our economy to compete in the digital age. Let's set high standards for our schools and give them the resources they need to succeed. Let's recruit a new army of teachers, and give them better pay and more support in exchange for more accountability. Let's make college more affordable, and let's invest in scientific research, and let's lay down broadband lines through the heart of inner cities and rural towns all across America.
But all of this cannot come to pass until we bring an end to this war in Iraq. Most of you know I opposed this war from the start. I thought it was a tragic mistake. Today we grieve for the families who have lost loved ones, the hearts that have been broken, and the young lives that could have been. America, it's time to start bringing our troops home. It's time to admit that no amount of American lives can resolve the political disagreement that lies at the heart of someone else's civil war. That's why I have a plan that will bring our combat troops home by March of 2008. Letting the Iraqis know that we will not be there forever is our last, best hope to pressure the Sunni and Shia to come to the table and find peace.
How about "hope"? Seven times. Count `em:
In the face of despair, you believe there can be hope.
It was here, in Springfield, where North, South, East and West come together that I was reminded of the essential decency of the American people - where I came to believe that through this decency, we can build a more hopeful America.
And that is why, in the shadow of the Old State Capitol, where Lincoln once called on a divided house to stand together, where common hopes and common dreams still, I stand before you today to announce my candidacy for President of the United States.
Most of all, let's be the generation that never forgets what happened on that September day and confront the terrorists with everything we've got. Politics doesn't have to divide us on this anymore - we can work together to keep our country safe. I've worked with Republican Senator Dick Lugar to pass a law that will secure and destroy some of the world's deadliest, unguarded weapons. We can work together to track terrorists down with a stronger military, we can tighten the net around their finances, and we can improve our intelligence capabilities. But let us also understand that ultimate victory against our enemies will come only by rebuilding our alliances and exporting those ideals that bring hope and opportunity to millions around the globe.
Letting the Iraqis know that we will not be there forever is our last, best hope to pressure the Sunni and Shia to come to the table and find peace.
That is why this campaign can't only be about me. It must be about us - it must be about what we can do together. This campaign must be the occasion, the vehicle, of your hopes, and your dreams. It will take your time, your energy, and your advice - to push us forward when we're doing right, and to let us know when we're not. This campaign has to be about reclaiming the meaning of citizenship, restoring our sense of common purpose, and realizing that few obstacles can withstand the power of millions of voices calling for change.
By ourselves, this change will not happen. Divided, we are bound to fail.
But the life of a tall, gangly, self-made Springfield lawyer tells us that a different future is possible.
He tells us that there is power in words.
He tells us that there is power in conviction.
That beneath all the differences of race and region, faith and station, we are one people.
He tells us that there is power in hope.
And what about that "hard work"? One time, and one time only:
But Washington has a long way to go. And it won't be easy. That's why we'll have to set priorities. We'll have to make hard choices. And although government will play a crucial role in bringing about the changes we need, more money and programs alone will not get us where we need to go. Each of us, in our own lives, will have to accept responsibility - for instilling an ethic of achievement in our children, for adapting to a more competitive economy, for strengthening our communities, and sharing some measure of sacrifice. So let us begin. Let us begin this hard work together. Let us transform this nation.
So I dunno. Call me a sucker for starpower. Call me a dreamer. Whatever.
The NYT didn't fail to note the symbolism in Obama's "gloveless" appearance on the steps of the frigid Capitol while others braved the single-digit frostiness to listen to what the man had to say.
But the usual suspects remain skeptical:
Still, for all the excitement on display, Mr. Obama's speech also marked the start of a tough new phase in what until now has been a charmed introduction to national politics. Democrats and Mr. Obama's aides said they were girding for questions about his experience in national politics, his command of policy, a past that has gone largely unexamined by rivals and the news media, and a public persona defined more by his biography and charisma than by how he would seek to use the powers of the presidency."He's done impressively so far, but at some point he's really going to have to move to the next stage," said Walter Mondale, the former Democratic vice president who made the phrase "where's the beef" famous in his 1984 challenge to the credentials of a rival, Gary Hart, the former senator from Colorado.
The formal entry to the race framed a challenge that would seem daunting to even the most talented politician: whether Mr. Obama, with all his strengths and limitations, can win in a field dominated by Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, who brings years of experience in presidential politics, a command of policy and political history, and an extraordinarily battle-tested network of fund-raisers and advisers.
The big question in my mind is whether a man armed with little more than, heart, hopes, dreams, and hard work will beat the odds against "an extraordinarily battle-tested network of fund-raisers and advisers." Yeah, there's a certain presumptuousness to assuming that he can. A certain audacity.
Of course, there's always that "little" issue of the War.
But more than anything, Mr. Obama's aides said, they believe the biggest advantage he has over Mrs. Clinton is his difference in position on the Iraq war. Mrs. Clinton supported the war authorization four years ago. Mr. Obama has opposed the war from the start, and has introduced a bill to begin withdrawing United States troops no later than May 1, with the goal of removing all combat brigades by March 31, 2008, taking a far more explicit stance than Mrs. Clinton on ending the conflict.
Mr. Edwards dropped a couple of notches in my book with this little stab:
Some Democrats, including Mr. Obama's opponents, seem increasingly game to challenge him, particularly when it comes to the substance of an Obama candidacy. Mr. Edwards offered a hint of what Mr. Obama faced in an interview the other day, as he discussed national health care, when he was asked his reaction to Mr. Obama's views on providing national coverage."I haven't seen a plan from him," Mr. Edwards said. "Have you all?"
Responding to some of these criticisms, Obama said:
There are those who don't believe in talking about hope: they say, well, we want specifics, we want details, we want white papers, we want plans. We've had a lot of plans, Democrats. What we've had is a shortage of hope.
Not bad.
But some Democrats were scornful. "That's nonsense," Mr. Hart said. "It posits that it's either-or. Who's saying you can't talk about hope? I'm not talking about white papers: I'm talking about one big speech about `How I view the world.' "
Well, take heart, Mr. Hart, how's this--for a start?
A jump start.
From the Defibrillator.
The New York Times report says Obama's
trying to offer himself as the grass-roots outsider in contrast to a member of a political family that has dominated Washington life for 15 years, presented his campaign as an effort "not just to hold an office, but to gather with you to transform a nation."
He's not going to have to "try" very hard. Because as far as I can see, he is the "real deal."
Check out this December 1995 article on the "Lawyer, teacher, philanthropist, and author" who "doesn't need another career. But he's entering politics to get back to his true passion--community organization."
What Makes Obama Run?
Doesn't sound like he's changed his tune much in the past decade.
Yeah, I'll be picking apart that one next--unless one of y'all beats me to it!
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